The arrestees, Henry and Jean, are out of jail! They were released early this morning.

We’re still waiting for confirmation of what their charges are from the lawyer. We’ll update all when we know. Thanks Henry and Jean ?? And thanks to all the wonderful people who did legal support and jail support. Can’t do it without you!?

And thanks to the other two arrestees from Monday, July 24th’s action at Kinder Morgan – Stardust and Bob ???

Richmond, CA — In a sign of growing escalation, seven protesters locked themselves to steel barrels and blocked three gates of the Kinder Morgan Richmond Terminal for the second time in two weeks, demanding that the company halt its new Trans Mountain pipeline in Canada. In what many environmental and Indigenous activists are starting to call the “Standing Rock of the North,” the controversial project would triple the capacity of an existing pipeline from Edmonton, Calgary to Burnaby, British Columbia — an increase to 890,000 barrels per day. This project is based on the extraction of tar sands oil, one of the world’s dirtiest fossil fuels.

If arrests are made, protesters will need donations for bail ASAP. Watch here for the DONATE link, if it becomes necessary.

“Our First Nations relatives are not going to allow the Trans Mountain pipeline to go through their territories in Canada,” said Pennie Opal Plant of Idle No More SF Bay. “Investing in any fossil fuel infrastructure is foolish. We all know that we must transition off of fossil fuels in order to prevent catastrophic climate change. Why waste so many resources on a losing proposition?”

The growing Bay Area resistance to this Kinder Morgan pipeline stands with over 140 tribes comprising The Treaty Alliance Against Tar Sands Expansion. The groundbreaking alliance of Indigenous nations formally opposes all tar sands pipelines crossing their traditional lands and waters. The recently elected government of British Columbia also opposes the project.

“Thanks to California’s brand new cap and trade climate bill AB 398, it’s now extremely likely that this very terminal we are blocking today will be a destination point for the tar sands oil that would be piped in by Trans Mountain,” said Andres Soto of Communities for a Better Environment. “AB 398 is an abomination and a threat to environmental justice worldwide.”

AB 398 passed just two weeks earlier despite opposition from a broad coalition of climate and environmental justice groups. The new law blocks the ability of local air quality agencies from establishing rules limiting greenhouse gases and opens up the door for refining tar sands crude in Richmond, which would worsen air pollution in surrounding communities.

“From the fence-lines of Richmond, we stand in solidarity with the First Nations fighting on the frontlines of tar sands extraction,” said Adrian Wilson of Diablo Rising Tide. “It is time to start fighting back against these oil companies polluting our communities from the cradle to the grave of the fossil fuel death cycle.”

Kinder Morgan, a spin-off from Enron, is one of North America’s largest energy infrastructure companies. The company claims it will start construction on its 715-mile Trans Mountain pipeline in September despite fierce opposition to the project from numerous First Nations and other communities and cities along its path.

“We salute all the water protectors, coast protectors and climate warriors on the front lines of these pipeline battles, standing up for Indigenous rights, the water and a safe climate,” said Grand Chief Serge Simon of the Mohawk Council of Kanesatake on behalf of the Indigenous Nations who have signed the Treaty Alliance Against Tar Sands Expansion. “Resistance to Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain Expansion tar sands pipeline and tanker project will be strongest in British Columbia, but it won’t stop there: Kinder Morgan can count on fierce resistance all over North America by Indigenous People and their allies.”

“This is clearly just the beginning,” said Patrick McCully of Rainforest Action Network. “This is the second week in a row that activists are blockading this facility — and you can expect protests up and down the West Coast as banks and oil companies continue to try and profit from climate chaos and human rights violations that will be caused by these disastrous tar sands pipelines. Companies like Kinder Morgan are on notice. Banks like JPMorgan Chase are on notice. Get out of tar sands. Get out of extreme oil. Get out of the climate change business and get on the right side of science and history.”

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Diablo Rising Tide is the San Francisco Bay Area chapter of Rising Tide North America. Rising Tide North America is an all-volunteer grassroots organizing network in Canada, the U.S., and Mexico who confronts the root causes of climate change with non-violent direct action and grassroots organizing and education. You can find out more at www.diablorisingtide.org

San Francisco, CA– Today, the Trump Administration announced that they were pulling out of the Paris Climate Agreement. Rising Tide North America responded with the following statement:

“In unsurprising news today, Donald J. Trump announced that the United States would be formally withdrawing from the Global Agreement on Climate Change finalized in Paris in December 2015.

Fulfilling yet another promise made in the 2016 election, Trump’s decision clearly demonstrates his callous disregard for our shared planet and for the communities that are bearing the brunt of violent changes in our climate and weather patterns. While the administration’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement is an inexcusable step backward in confronting the challenge of dramatic climate change it is not a particularly dramatic departure from the status quo approach to climate change that we have seen from both major political parties in the United States.

While the Paris Climate Agreement was widely applauded by mainstream environmental organizations, the agreement represents a global consensus on a neo-liberal corporate approach to global warming. The final deal, signed by over 200 nations, favored the rights and voices of corporations over the rights and voices of people across the planet. It excluded the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, omitted reparations to the Global South and lacked significant mechanics to implement its stated aspirational goal of reaching 1.5 degrees warming. Essentially, the Paris Climate Agreement represented false hope to large well-funded environmental groups and liberal governments across the planet.

While the Paris Agreement and the neo-liberal global consensus certainly falls far short of meaningfully addressing the current climate crisis, the rising authoritarianism and denial of climate science exhibited by the Trump administration embodies an even more dangerous direction. The appointment of right-wing climate denying politicians and fossil fuel executives into powerful positions at the Departments of State, Interior, Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency is troubling sign that struggles around environmental and climate justice will be more difficult. Furthermore, Trump’s disturbing rhetoric from global warming being a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese to the criminalization of migrants, Muslims and many others further signals that truth, reason and equity are continued fabrications in the White House.

Regardless of the status of global climate agreements, we still live in a moment that demands people-powered escalation against the corporate state. As it becomes more and more apparent that the state is not interested in–or capable of–addressing the current climate crisis we must recognize that it is the responsibility of communities across the country and around the world to engage in bold direct action to stop the fossil fuel industry and build an equitable and ecologically sound future..

Today, as oil began flowing through the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) and new revelations about DAPL’s parent company, Energy Transfer Partners, hiring a private mercenary firm to run a counterinsurgency operation against water protectors in North Dakota and elsewhere, Rising Tide North America will continue to stand in solidarity with movements and people directly affected by the climate crisis. We will continue to build people-powered movements in response to these threats upon all of our lives. We will organize direct action that mobilizes people to challenge ongoing racism, imperialism and capitalism perpetrated by politicians and corporations throughout the world.

Relying on governments and trying to work with corporations has been the dominant strategy of the mainstream environmental movement as a whole for over 50 years. This has failed, utterly. Only by relying on each other, taking risks, and escalating – even in the face of the ongoing criminalization of direct action– can we preserve a livable, just planet for all.”

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Rising Tide North America is an all-volunteer anti-capitalist climate justice network working to challenge the root cause of climate change.

April 29th: #FloodTrump is Coming to Washington DC!

As we near the 100-day anniversary of Trump’s presidency, hundreds of thousands will converge in Washington DC for the People’s Climate Mobilization.

RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/1807213426198166/

Alongside the major PCM march for jobs, justice, and climate, it’s time to take direct action to keep fossil fuels in the ground, stop dirty oil and gas pipelines, and build a just and sustainable future. Sign up to Flood Trump with action: http://bit.ly/FloodTrump

On SATURDAY, April 29th, immediately following the march, we’ll Flood Trump – we’ll meet up near the National Mall (15th and Constitution) by the Washington Monument. Follow the blue flags to join in, and bring your friends and a message from home to leave with Trump and his oily climate-denying friends. Join a mass sit-in as we share art, music, food, and stories of resistance and strategy about our work back home.

Trump’s ugly agenda of hate and climate denial has made it more clear than ever that climate action must come from the people. The lines in the sand have been drawn, and the stakes couldn’t be higher. The climate showdown is coming – let’s Flood Trump.

Keokuk, IA – At approximately noon a water protector, Cameron Kennedy, 27, of Minneapolis locked onto the drilling waste vehicle Dakota Access Pipeline has been using to transport drilling byproduct to an unlined earthen pit near the Des Moines River on Johnson Street Road in Keokuk, Iowa.

Samples from this earthen pit have been taken and are currently being tested to report levels of contamination allowed in an unlined earthen pit per standards of the EPA. This vehicle has been key in DAPL’s drilling underneath the Mississippi River here in Keokuk, Iowa.

“This truck is essential to the operation of the horizontal directional drilling occurring under the Mississippi. When the sludge tank is full, it must be transported and emptied before work continues,” Joe Byson of Colorado said today.

Kennedy locked onto the back frame of the truck. Initially, according to footage obtained, the driver of the truck refused to stop his vehicle. One arrest has been made of another supporter in the area. Yesterday, Krissanna Mara, another water protector, and Jenn Siege, an accredited member of the press were released from Lee County Sheriff’s custody. As of 1:30PM Kennedy is still reported to be locked on, hampering construction of DAPL.

This event continues to be a part of Mississippi Stand, a nonviolent direct action campaign in Keokuk, Iowa with aims to stop the drilling underneath the Mississippi. The camp, known as Mississippi Stand, has been in place since August 31st and was established in solidarity with Standing Rock, a Lakota camp challenging DAPL in North Dakota, and other Native American efforts to keep DAPL from destroying sacred and traditional lands. Workers are boring under the Mississippi river 24 hours a day. About 150 people have been arrested while peacefully protesting at the site to date. Public input was not allowed during planning for the pipeline route and permits were hastily granted without proper environmental studies. There are major community concerns around the safety of the project for the quality of the Missouri, Mississippi and Illinois Rivers.

“There is another way, we have the technology, we have the infrastructure, we cannot continue to destroy our resources so that a select few from big oil can profit. We invite others to take a stand and say “no more” to big oil.” Alex Cohen.

Tonight the community in Keokuk, Iowa plans to rally through downtown to inform the public and stand in solidarity with these water protectors across the country. Images available at https://www.facebook.com/MississippiStandCamp/